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| Mary Bernice Tisdale, cartes de visite c1873 |
Mary Bernice Tisdale (1853-1886)
These are two identical photos of Mary Tisdale from Belle's collection and both are damaged. The original carte de visite was taken by Souby who had two studios in New Orleans, one on Canal Street and one on Magazine street.
Through the magic of photo editing software I was able to repair the picture to something close to its original condition.
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| Back of cartes de visite |
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| Repaired photograph |
Belle Tisdale's sister, Mary Bernice, was 15 years old when she wrote this letter to her father, Benjamin Franklin Tisdale. Belle and Mary had been living with Grandma and Grandpa Pratt near Baton Rouge for over a year. Brothers Frank and Willie were there, too. Eliza and the younger children had been there since March. Now they were going home to New Orleans.
The original letter is written in ink on lined paper, 7 3/4” x 9 3/4,” from Mary Bernice Tisdale to Benjamin Franklin Tisdale. The ink is faded. The page is folded in half and then in thirds, one third decorated with scallops in the corners, and addressed “To Papa To Papa from Mary.” There is no address and no stamp, so it may have been included in another envelope. Transcribed exactly as written.
Oak land Aug 4, 1868
Dear Papa
Ant I glad you have sent for us my
dream has come true. I dreamed you sent for us and shure enough you
did. You will expect us down on the Govener Allen about three
Saturday[s] hence forth. be expecting us Mama thought She would not
write to you as long as we were writing. We are all very well and
Robert is the sweetest little fellow that ever lived and the
smartest. the night before last Mama was getting him to sleep and he
would not hush crying, and Mama asked him if he was going to hush and
he said no sur bebobo.
It has been raining for two weeks
and it has just stoped. Grand Pa will loose all of his fder [fodder]
from the rain. I am getting along very well in my arithmetic, but I
am going backward in writing I do not know why I do for I write
every day. We were very sorry to hear that you had been sick. I am
not very well I have got an awful collor and Grand Ma says I need
some kind of bitters.
If you see Annie give her my love
and tell her [torn] t Robert often speaks of her and says Annie an
[torn] good Annie and then he begins to cry.
I have no more news good by God bless
you
from your effectionate Daughter
Mary B Tisdale
Back, upper right corner in pencil in
B. F. Tisdale's hand:
Mary Aug 4/68
Recd 10
The Steamboat Governor Allen
Perhaps
Uncle Jenie drove Eliza and the children in the wagon to the
riverfront in Baton Rouge where the 136 foot side wheel steamboat
Governor Allen waited.
The trip downriver would have taken about eight hours. The Governor
Allen was in the New Orleans to Ouachita River trade around that time and her captain was John
Smoker. http://www.riverboatdaves.com/captains/s.html
The
wooden hull packet boat was named for Brigadier General Henry Watkins
Allen, the last Confederate governor of Louisiana during the Civil
War. He was elected in the fall of 1863 and took office in January of
1864. Born in 1820 in Virginia he settled on a sugar plantation on the
west side of the Mississippi River, north of Baton Rouge. He fought
in the Texas War of Independence and served as an officer in the
Confederate army. He was wounded at Shiloh and his legs were
seriously injured at the Battle of Baton Rouge and he was never able
to walk again without crutches. Allen was an excellent governor and set
up state-owned factories to produce cloth and rope as well as
turpentine and medicines. He initiated cotton trade with Mexico
through Texas but just when his programs were becoming profitable the
war ended. “He ordered all the goods in state store sold for state,
not Confederate, currency, giving some worth to this paper...”
Allen left Louisiana for Mexico and died in Mexico City in 1866.
(Taylor, Louisiana, A History,
p. 97-99) Port Allen, a small city across the Mississippi from Baton
Rouge, was named for him in 1878.
For
more on Governor Allen, including a photo, see Louisiana Anthology.
New Orleans in 1868
When Eliza and the
children stepped off the steam boat onto the levee at New Orleans on
that hot, humid day in August 1868 they would find a city whose
political situation was as steamy as the weather.
Gary Van Zante
writes in New Orleans 1867, “New Orleans had experienced the
humiliation of defeat and capture early in the war and would endure
fifteen years of military occupation....” There were 5000 troops stationed in New Orleans in the late 1860s. Many buildings, from cotton presses and hospitals to hotels and private residences had been seized for military use. “The 'eternal
enmity' that, as one journalist wrote, 'animates our hearts, and the
hearts of every citizen of our beloved city, to those who have
invaded and conquered us,' surely could be felt on the streets of
the occupied city.”
(Van Zante, New
Orleans 1867, p. 22)
The Military
Reconstruction Acts of 1867 resulted in part from the bloody riot of
1866. The Acts divided the South into five military districts, each
commanded by a major general. Louisiana and Texas made up the Fifth
District, under General Philip Sheridan. All adult males, black and
white, who could swear they had not voluntarily aided the
Confederacy, were registered to vote and elected delegates to the
Constitutional Convention of 1867-1868 in New Orleans. State offices
were still located in New Orleans at that time. The new constitution
was ratified in April of 1868. State officials were elected at the
same time and, with former Confederates disenfranchised, Republicans
won all offices. Henry Clay Warmoth, a former Union officer, was
elected governor. He had also served as provost judge in New Orleans
during the occupation. (Joe Gray Taylor, Louisiana, A History)
The occupation and
reconstruction period had been repressive and heavy handed. Any word
or action against the Union or in favor of the Confederacy was cause
for being called before the Provost Marshal and many people were
imprisoned at Fort Jackson and Ship Island for seemingly minor
infractions. Benjamin Franklin Tisdale's older brother, Nathan O. J.
Tisdale, was called before the Provost Marshal because someone
brought a cake decorated with the Confederate flag in icing to a bake sale that was being held at his home to benefit the orphans of the city.
When Eliza and the
children returned to New Orleans political groups were preparing for
the presidential election of 1868. Democrats hoped to defeat the
Republican Ulysses S. Grant and end Radical Reconstruction. Feelings
between the two factions were so heated that riots erupted on October
24 and lasted for four days until Governor Warmoth called in Major
General L. H. Rousseau, commander of the military department of
Louisiana. Democratic candidate Horatio Seymour carried Louisiana,
mostly because of intimidation of Republican voters, but Grant was
elected president. (Taylor, Louisiana, A History, p. 107)
To maintain control
of the state, Gov. Warmoth and the Republican legislature passed a
law providing for a Returning Board to make the final tabulation of
vote and to throw out the vote from any precinct or parish in which
fraud or intimidation had taken place. Joel Taylor writes:
“Created to
prevent the stealing of elections by
the Democrats, in practice the returning Board could be just as
useful in stealing an election from the Democrats...In every
Louisiana election from 1868 through 1878 there was so much fraud,
intimidation, and other skulduggery that it is impossible to say who
won a majority of the votes actually cast or who would have won had
an honest election been held. In passing, it might be noted that
almost the same thing could be said for elections long after
Reconstruction was over.”
As an interesting
side note, Mrs. Ulysses S. Grant's brother-in-law, James F. Casey,
was collector of customs in New Orleans during this time period and
was campaigning to become U. S. Senator from Louisiana. (Taylor,
Louisiana, A History, p. 107)
We don't know how
long the family stayed in New Orleans, but the next letter we have
was written on April 27, 1869 by Belle from Baton Rouge. Eliza and
all the children are again living at the Pratt home. They are still
living there in 1870 at the time of the census.
